Leadership Team

Alex Melen – Co-CEO & CFO

Alex Melen is the Co-CEO & CFO of Melen, LLC and brings over 10 years of digital media experience. Before Melen LLC, he spent several years heading up digital/analytics on the Walmart account at Starcom MediaVest Group (SMG). During the late 1990’s, Alex founded T35 Hosting – one of the first and largest free web hosting providers. Now a division of Melen LLC, T35 Hosting has recently surpassed the 2 million member mark and continues to be ranked in the top 3,000 web properties in the world.

Alex has been featured numerous times in Business Week, Forbes and other publications. In 2001, he was named the #19 teen entrepreneurs in the U.S. by Young Biz Magazine. In 2006, Alex was named one of America’s Top 25 Best Entrepreneurs by BusinessWeek.

Alex is a graduate of Babson College, one of the top entrepreneurial schools in the nation. Alex graduated from Babson with honors and was awarded the highly prestigious Babson Student Business Initiative Award.

Michael Melen – Co-CEO & COO

Michael Melen is the Co-CEO & COO of Melen, LLC. Michael has been captivated by the entrepreneurial environment of the internet from a young age. At 16, Michael was honored by a mention in Forbes Magazine for his ventures in the social networking space. In 2008, Michael founded “Melen” as a sole proprietorship with goals of exploring website development.

Michael’s entrepreneurial spirit led him to start various online ventures, including Free Online Game Finder, Myspace Gateway, Proxy Key, Inforum Advertising and Social Elves. Having explored the dynamics of several spaces, Michael founded Backlink Build – an SEO company specializing in off-page SEO for small businesses. Backlink Build is now one of the core businesses of Melen, LLC and is the backbone of its SEO practice.

Michael is a graduate of Cornell University and co-founded Melen, LLC upon graduation.

Max Budovskiy – EVP, Director of Ecommerce

Max Budovskiy manages the e-commerce operations at Melen. He is a recent graduate of Cornell University class of ’11. His role focuses on establishing new e-commerce operations as well as managing the day-to-day operations of existing websites. He is currently working on OutdoorGear.net, an e-commerce website focusing on selling goods such as camping, hunting, and survival gear. With his finance and marketing background, Budovskiy is always looking to fill the needs of an always evolving e-commerce marketplace. His goal is to bring manufacturers’ products directly to the customers through online stores that provide the best shopping experience on the net.

 

 

Edipo Cravo – EVP, Director of Sales

Edipo Cravo grew up in an entrepreneurial environment. With a passion for entrepreneurship and languages Ed is now fluent in Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and English. Ed studied entrepreneurship and finance at Cornell University’s highly ranked Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management. Ed earned an internship right after freshman year at a business brokerage firm and spent the next two summers working as a Business and Technology Analyst at Deloitte Consulting LLP.

While at Cornell Ed was part of the exceptional chapter of Delta Kappa Epsilon international fraternity and was highly involved with the campus entrepreneurial community. Turning down a full time offer from Deloitte Ed joined Melen, LLC and now leads the sales force as the Executive Vice President, Director of Sales. Ed strongly believes that keeping clients extremely satisfied leads to better long-term business for both parties.

 

Oleg Korneitchouk – EVP, Director of Web Development

At a young age Oleg was intrigued by problem solving. He set his mind to chess where he quickly became a regular finalist at chess tournaments in the North East. In high school, he was introduced to the world of websites and began to develop his own from a young age. Since then, he has taught himself all of the necessities for creating, developing and maintaining websites, including design, coding and search engine optimization. Currently, he is finishing his degrees in marketing and psychology at Rutgers University. During his free time, he enjoys researching and developing new ideas on SEO, marketing and consumer behavior.

 

 

Jeremy Fein – EVP, Director of Technology

Jeremy is the EVP, Director of Technology and Lead Software Engineer at Melen, LLC. He previously interned at Google, where he worked on the AdWords platform. Originally from Miami, Florida, Jeremy has always had a passion for computers and technology and a desire to share that passion with others. He volunteered over 1,000 hours of time in high school to teach elementary students, middle school students, and autistic students how to build and program robots. Jeremy also won first place in the Computer Science Category at the Florida Science Fair and third place at the International Intel Science & Engineering Fair for his research in path planning with genetic algorithms. These achievements culminated into Jeremy winning the Miami-Dade Silver Knight Award in Science – the highest honor given to students interested in science and technology in Miami, Florida.

 

Peter Fu – EVP, Director of Content

Peter Fu is the Director of Content of Melen, LLC. Peter always had a passion for writing and generating worthwhile contents for people to read. As an English major at Cornell University concentrating on Creative Writing and former debate team member, he understands exactly what captures his audiences’ attention and what needs to be done at the editing stages to ensure that the content created under his eyes are top-notch quality. Peter has served as a former blogger on the Cornell Daily Sun and as such, has a firm grasp on the progression of writing from a physical medium to an electronic one.

 

Andee Fonder – EVP, Director of Web Design

A native to California, Andee grew up in North Hollywood in a creative and technical heavy environment. At his first job, Andee worked on restoring the internal electronics and exterior design of vintage, 1950-80’s arcade systems to their perfect original condition, appearing on shows such as Modern Marvels, Attack of the Show! and Newsweek Magazine.

With a passion in design and web technology, Andee launched his first web property in 2002, starting his career path at the age of 16. Within a few years, Andee independently moved across the country and studied design and web development with peers at MSOE and MIAD. Throughout this time, he worked with companies such as Sears, Roebuck and Co., Best Buy/Geek Squad and Chevrolet before settling in New Jersey.

Andee joined Melen, LLC in July 2011 where he manages the design/development team that handle both internal brands and client projects. He has spearheaded the design process for Melen’s public identity and brands, including Web Master Icons, Outdoor Gear, Host SEO, Social Jump and more.

Matthew Prepis – EVP, Director of Client Management

Matthew Prepis is a graduate of Rutgers University with a degree in English and a minor in Music. While studying at Rutgers, Matthew focused his attention on his two greatest passions, singing and writing, where he was President of the Rutgers University Glee Club and Editor-in-chief for the Rutgers University Historical Society. At school he balanced school work and various jobs, including teaching gymnastics and interning for a New Jersey marketing company.

Since starting at Melen, he has been involved with various projects including the launch of Melen LLC’s new social media brand, Social Jump, which since its launch has started growing at a fast pace. Matt hopes to build Melen’s current client basis to extend over all seven continents by offering Backlink Build’s top notch link building to some of the world’s major marketing companies.

Danielle Gaglioti – Social Media Project Manager

Danielle Gaglioti is the Social Media Project Manager at Melen, LLC. With a degree in journalism and media studies from Rutgers University, Danielle has experience in strategic content writing, social media marketing, and content management. With these skills, Danielle works to enhance the online image of Melen LLC and the online image of its clients. She also plans to integrate her experience in film and multimedia editing into future social media and blogging campaigns to give clients the best exposure.

Before joining the staff at Melen LLC, Danielle held the positions of managing editor at a youth news website and as the broadcast operations supervisor at Rutgers University television network. She has also been involved in various nationally recognized journalism projects, co-founded a thriving online music network, and has been published in several New Jersey media outlets, including the Asbury Park Press and NJBiz.com.

Aleksey Batrachenko – Assistant Director of E-Commerce

Alex Batrachenko assists in the development and management of e-commerce operations at Melen. Working directly with Max, Alex assists in all day to day operations involving Outdoor Gear. Alex is currently completing his degree in Digital Marketing at The Zicklin School of Business at Baruch College. In addition, Alex holds a Series 7 and Series 63 licenses and was previously employed as an equity broker in several financial firms, including National Securities, Brookstone Securities and John Thomas Financial. Alex is also fluent in Russian and has also been employed as a translator for currency trading giant, FXCM. With his background in sales and financial markets, Alex hopes to help grow Melen’s e-commerce operations to newer heights, establishing the properties as forerunners in their respective niche.

 

Stephen Sepulveda – Web and Graphic Designer

Stephen Sepulveda is a graphic designer with a strong passion for creativity. From a young age, his creativity sparked a desire to learn and explore various mediums of art ranging from traditional drawing to more modern creative practices like graphic design. His different types of art work have been recognized in exhibitions and in contests. Stephen now focuses his efforts with at Melen LLC, where he helps design a strong brand identity for Melen’s clients and sister brands. From logos to posters to brochures to websites, he enjoys the creative challenge, working directly with his clients, and pushing himself to produce the best work possible.

 

 

Steve Spagnola – Lead Programming Consultant

Steve Spagnola is the CEO of Stevesie, LLC and works closely with the Melen LLC team to deliver world class web technologies and services. Steve holds a Master’s Degree in Computer Science and a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from Cornell University. Throughout his education, Steve’s research has been published in the 9th International Conference on Computational Semantics (Oxford, United Kingdom, January 2011) and The 11th Annual ACM/IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (Ottawa, Canada, June 2011).